


starving faithful

by schweet_heart



Series: Merlin Fic [23]
Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1992), Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angry Sex, Angst, Blood Drinking, Bonus Challenge #1, Community: pornalot, Community: trope_bingo, D/s undertones, Dark fic, Fingering, Human/Vampire Relationship, M/M, Porn With Plot, Smut, Superheroes and supervillains, Unhappy Ending, Unsafe Sex, Violence, death and dead bodies, major character (un)death, neck porn, remix eligible
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-16
Updated: 2016-08-16
Packaged: 2018-08-09 03:45:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7785487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schweet_heart/pseuds/schweet_heart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>BtVS fusion. Arthur is a Slayer. Merlin is a vampire. They're mortal enemies, except that they're also not.</p><p>Inspired by Pornalot Bonus Challenge #1: Superheroes and Supervillains and my "dark fic" trope_bingo square.</p>
            </blockquote>





	starving faithful

**Author's Note:**

> Some of the warnings are spoiler-ish, so please see the bottom of the fic for notes.

 

“This…isn’t what it looks like,” Merlin said.  
  
“It  _looks_  like you’re crouching over a dead body,” Arthur said, and to his surprise his voice came out sounding perfectly calm. “And drinking its blood.”  
  
“Oh.” Merlin blinked. “Well, yeah, I guess this is exactly what it looks like then.”

 

 

 

 

Arthur dragged him by the wrist into the nearest open crypt and shoved him down the stairs with both hands, slamming the door behind them. Merlin stumbled, caught himself on the sarcophagus in the middle of the room, and turned to face him, his breath coming a little fast as he braced himself for a fight. For a moment Arthur was distracted by this — did vampires even need to breathe? Or was it just a reflex? — but then he forced himself to pay attention. This wasn’t Merlin, not anymore. This was a monster in his best friend’s skin, and as such, he was dangerous.   
  
“Explain,” he ordered, his voice tight. “How long have you been — like this?”  
  
“How long have I been a vampire, you mean?” Merlin asked. There was still blood on his chin, vivid against his pale skin, and he licked it off absently while he considered the question. Arthur’s stomach rolled. “All my life.”  
  
“Bullshit,” Arthur said. “I’ve known you since we were seven. Vampires don’t age.”  
  
“Most of them don’t,” Merlin corrected, shrugging. “Apparently I’m a special case — I was born like this.”  
  
Arthur scoffed. “You’re not that special.”  
  
Merlin just smiled, revealing a row of bloody, pointed teeth. Arthur turned and threw up into one of the funeral urns.  

 

 

 

Merlin was quicker than Arthur would have given him credit for, and although he was thin and gangly, he was stronger than he looked. He blocked Arthur’s first blow easily, dancing out of reach beneath his right arm, then slammed a fist into the small of Arthur’s back that had him staggering to his knees before he even saw it coming.  
  
“Arthur,” Merlin warned. “I don’t want to hurt you.”  
  
Arthur snarled, clutching at his stomach as he dragged in air. “Fuck you,” he said. “You were my best friend.”  
  
“I still am,” Merlin said.   
  
“You’re a monster,” Arthur said, and kicked him in the face.

 

 

 

 

Arthur had a split lip and a handful of bruised ribs, the beginnings of a shiner over his left eye, and he had wrenched one of his ankles when he’d landed wrong after Merlin had thrown him across the room. Merlin, irritatingly, looked barely winded, although Arthur had broken his nose and one of his wrists only a few minutes before. Vampires healed fast. Faster than he did. For the first time, Arthur started to wonder whether he would actually be the one to walk away from this fight.  
  
“Look,” Merlin said, circling warily around the grave away from Arthur. His hands brushed through the dust on the top of the sarcophagus, leaving wavering finger trails. “I’m still the same person. Just a little different than you expected. All the signs were there, you know, if you’d thought to look for them. Pale skin, never sleeps, can’t stand sunlight or anything to do with garlic…”  
  
“You go to  _church_ ,” Arthur exploded. “You’re — you sang in the  _choir_.”  
  
“Yeah, well.” Merlin looked away. “Not everything you see in horror movies is true, you know. Although it’s obvious where you’ve been getting your information from.” He prodded at Arthur’s gym bag and its assorted weaponry with one foot. “Crosses and holy water? Really, Arthur?”  
  
“It works on most vampires,” Arthur said, folding his arms.   
  
“I’m not most vampires.”  
  
“So I gather.”  
  
The two of them glared at each other for a moment, before Merlin heaved a sigh and lifted up both hands in a gesture of surrender. “So,” he said. “You never told me you were the Slayer.”  
  
“And you never told me you were a fiend from hell,” Arthur said. Maybe if he repeated it enough times, he could talk himself into remembering that fact. “Seems like we’ve both been keeping secrets from one another.”  
  
“How does this work, exactly?” Merlin said. “I mean, do you want one free punch to make up for all the years of friendship you think you’ve lost, or — ?”  
  
“What I want is for you to stop asking stupid questions,” Arthur said, but it came out more pained than angry. “Preferably so that I can  _kill you_.”  
  
“Arthur.” For a moment, Merlin’s voice was soft, sympathetic, the same way it had been when they stayed up late at night and Arthur told him all his secrets. “Just because we’re supposed to be mortal enemies doesn’t mean we have to kill each other. We can talk about this.”  
  
“I think I’m done talking, if it’s all the same to you.”

 

 

 

  
“I don’t think you really want to kill me,” Merlin said a few minutes later, panting a little. He stared up into Arthur’s face above the point of the stake that was currently hovering a few inches from his heart. “I mean, I get that you’re angry, Arthur, I do, but you know me.”  
  
“Obviously I don’t,” Arthur said. He struggled to lower the stake still further, throwing his whole weight into fighting against Merlin’s unyielding grip. “Or I wouldn’t have overlooked the fact that you’re a blood-sucking  _vampire_.”  
  
“You’re my best friend.”  
  
“Your kind don’t have friends.”  
  
“Don’t we?” Merlin laughed a little. “Maybe you’re right. I’ve been in love with you since the day we met.”  
  
_That_  got Arthur’s attention. Distracted, he looked down at the vampire pinned beneath him, his grip slackening on the stake for a split second. It was long enough. With a vicious twist of his upper body, Merlin flipped them both so that Arthur was now the one flat on his back against the stone floor, the point of the stake scraping the skin along his jugular. Arthur swore.  
  
“You’re a demon,” he spat, angry that he had been so easily tricked. “You aren’t capable of love.”  
  
There was a clatter as Merlin wrenched the stake out of his hands and threw it across the room.  
  
“Try me,” he said.

 

 

 

 

In the stark moonlight Merlin’s pale skin burned white, stippled with shadows from the stained-glass windows of the crypt, the distorted crosses spreading across his back like stigmata. Naked, he was animalistic, all muscle and sinew over strong bone. Arthur was fascinated.  
  
“I still don’t see why I’m the only one not wearing clothes in this scenario,” Merlin said, his preternaturally blue eyes following Arthur as he studied him from all angles. “It doesn’t seem fair that I don’t get to look at you, too.”  
  
“Because I don’t trust you,” Arthur answered witheringly. “Obviously.”  
  
“I’m still a vampire even without my clothes on,” Merlin pointed out. “In fact, a case could be made that I’m even  _more_  dangerous like this, not less.”  
  
“Shut up, Merlin,” Arthur said. Merlin subsided, but he was smiling, and Arthur thought he knew why. It was the first normal thing Arthur had said to him all night.   
  
Merlin’s body was cool to the touch, something he had always laughed off as poor circulation, and his latest kill had been recent enough that the blood still pulsed through his veins like a heartbeat, strong and quick. Under the coppery tang of blood and death, he still smelled like Merlin, a smell Arthur had loved since before he knew what love really was. In spite of himself, Arthur found himself stepping closer, nosing his way up Merlin’s exposed throat and resting his hands lightly on his bare shoulders. Merlin shuddered.  
  
“I’ve always wondered how it felt,” he said, his voice coming out slightly breathless. “Being bitten.”  
  
“I can show you,” Arthur said. “If you want.”  
  
Merlin trembled as Arthur’s oil-slicked fingers trailed down his spine, but didn’t make a sound until Arthur pressed his lips to the lying pulse that beat wildly at the base of Merlin’s throat. When he gasped, Arthur bit down hard in punishment, relishing the way Merlin’s body bucked and then went limp against him, like a rabbit trapped in the jaws of a hound.   
  
“You like that, don’t you?” Arthur murmured, in between worrying at him gently. “All of that vampire strength, and you’re helpless when I touch you.”  
  
He wrapped one arm around Merlin’s torso to hold him up while the other slid down and down, pressing ruthlessly between the cheeks of Merlin’s buttocks to find his hole and push inside. Merlin bucked again as Arthur breached him, and Arthur’s teeth clamped down tighter on his throat, sucking at the damp skin, biting, laving it with his tongue and starting over again. Merlin shook, letting out high small sounds of desire. He gripped Arthur’s arm across his chest like it was all he could do to stay upright.   
  
“I’m going to fuck the Devil right out of you,” Arthur promised, holding tighter.  
  
“If you think it will work,” Merlin said, half laughing, then cried out as Arthur thrust another finger inside him, writhing as though in attempted escape. “Oh  _god_  — Arthur — please — ”  
  
Arthur was hard now, painfully so, his body reacting to the man in his arms even as his mind rebelled against it. Still he held his ground, working Merlin slowly open, rocking his hips against him while he sucked bruises into his neck that vanished within moments. Merlin was putty in his hands, his entire body given over to the pleasure of Arthur’s touch, and Arthur felt a surge of triumph that was altogether different from the kind of victory that came from winning a fight. At last, he withdrew his fingers, ignoring Merlin’s whine of protest, then unzipped his jeans and slicked himself up with quick strokes, so near to the edge that even this came perilously close to undoing him.   
  
When he finally slid his aching cock into Merlin’s entrance, the other man spasmed wildly, bowing backwards against him until his head hit the junction of Arthur’s shoulder and a low, breathy moan tore from his throat. He came dry — an interesting feature of vampiric anatomy that Arthur had heretofore not suspected — and from there it was easy, so easy, to let himself go so that instinct could take over. With his free hand Arthur caught at Merlin’s hair, kissing him almost savagely on the corner of his mouth as he thrust.  
  
“You’re not him,” he muttered against Merlin’s lips. “You’re not even human.”  
  
“But I love you.”  
  
Arthur ground his hips against Merlin’s ass and came, and forgot about the rest.

 

 

 

 

Later, Arthur picked himself up off the floor where the two of them had collapsed in a heap and cleaned himself up the best he could. Part of him was disgusted at his own weakness, letting his desire for a man who had never really existed blind him to what he really was, but another part simply observed that this was probably the most ironic use to which he had ever put his vial of holy oil. He wondered if contact with this much sin was enough to invalidate its warranty.  
  
Once that was done, he gathered up the rest of the things that had gotten scattered during the fight and went to kneel beside Merlin where he still slept, brushing a few strands of dark hair off his forehead with gentle fingers.   
  
“I love you too, you know,” he said, very softly, and drove the wooden stake home.

**Author's Note:**

>  **Warnings:** Character undeath, character death, discussion of dead bodies/blood drinking. Violence (non-sexual). Angst. Gratuitous neck porn. Fingering. Barebacking/unsafe sex with D/s undertones. Oh, and sex with a vampire, in a graveyard. That should about cover it.


End file.
